If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

Ever heard of Camden, NJ? One of the highest crime rates in the country with a population of 77K. Blacks make up 50% of their population. Walt Whitman was born in Camden. I wonder how he would write about his city today.

Ever heard of Camden, NJ? One of the highest crime rates in the country with a population of 77K. Blacks make up 50% of their population. Walt Whitman was born in Camden. I wonder how he would write about his city today.

I have a neighbor from NJ that has a friend in Camden who is white. He showed me pictures of his friends house. It's like a fortress surrounded by an 8' chain link fence. The friend says he's threatened almost every day because of his skin color.

"The beauty of the Second Amendment is that you won't need it until they try to take it away."---Thomas Jefferson

Scottsdale also is filled with unbelievable wealth, a vibrant society, and a plethora of opportunity and potential.

While Flint is the remnants of an abandoned city. Where essentially only those without education, resources, and connections were left. It's a land dearth of opportunity. Where there is not even enough minimum wage jobs to go around.

In some ways, Flint is sadder to drive through than Detroit. You expect decline in a large city like Detroit, but Flint is a small city-it used to be the third largest in the state, but Warren took that place a couple of decades ago. I think Livonia also has more people than Flint does. The schools are terrible, and there really aren't any alternatives. At least in Detroit, there are magnet schools within the public schools for advanced students and charter schools run through churches and other organizations to choose from.

In some ways, Flint is sadder to drive through than Detroit. You expect decline in a large city like Detroit, but Flint is a small city-it used to be the third largest in the state, but Warren took that place a couple of decades ago. I think Livonia also has more people than Flint does. The schools are terrible, and there really aren't any alternatives. At least in Detroit, there are magnet schools within the public schools for advanced students and charter schools run through churches and other organizations to choose from.

Scottsdale also is filled with unbelievable wealth, a vibrant society, and a plethora of opportunity and potential.

While Flint is the remnants of an abandoned city. Where essentially only those without education, resources, and connections were left. It's a land dearth of opportunity. Where there is not even enough minimum wage jobs to go around.

But it wasn't always the case. Scottsdale was a barely populated desert town until a few decades ago. It wasn't officially incorporated until 1951, and had a population of 2000. In 1951, Flint was the home of GM, and the center of the American auto industry, but since the late 70s, it's been bleeding jobs at an astonishing rate. GM used to employ over 80,000 people there (1978), but that number has dwindled to less than 8,000 and that doesn't reflect a 90% drop in the number of autos that GM manufactures or sells (The drop was bad, but not that bad).

Flint is a hellhole because the unions drove out the major employer and the city responded with higher taxes on those who remained.

Scottsdale is not a real city. It's an overgrown housing development. I've never been to Flint. Was it built as a retirement community?

Flint was a minor city that became a bastion of the American industry with much of the automotive industry essentially being based there, for both white and blue collar employees. With the big three alone employing almost half the equivalent population of the city it's self, all with excellent jobs. Unfortunately, those were the old original factories, many built from the dawn of the auto industry. Being as that many of them were built near the same time, they essentially fell apart near the same time. Industrial engineering, factory design, production planning, etc. all advanced greatly since their birth... Hence, in the majority of the cases it was far better off for the auto manufacturers to build new factories elsewhere, and they migrated most of their plants closer to Metro-Detroit and scattered a few across the nation to diversify slightly. It wasn't because of the unions, the new plants were still union, and mostly the same workforce. As production shifted else where, a down ward spiral set upon the city. As more factories moved, more supplier factories and distribution centers moved with them. More technical support moved. Being as most were moved only a few hours away, the work force themselves moved as well. Which resulted into an absolute glut of homes for a quickly dwindling population. So many professional, skilled trade, and quality labor jobs moved hours away; that all of the ancillary businesses had to downsize. It's a downward spiral that's really unfortunately hard to recover from, and Flint never has. They still have a glut of homes that are abandoned, archaic abandoned factories, and a dysfunctional city layout for their diminutive size.